Dropships

 Dropship

I was rather drunk when I pounded this out on my goddamn iphone lol.

you should listen to this as the lyrics are part of the story. You should also realize that I was drunk as shit when I wrote this, and I made the cardinal error of "tell, not show"

 https://youtu.be/bTNYbPirmyE?si=U5Wv4HjtSPSqHQZd

Creaking metal shook the nerves of the crew, firmly planted to their stations. A rescue mission, they’d still slipped into an active conflict: flak exploding in space silently shook their ship; the air inside reverberating with a sickening groan.

 

“Okes, hang tight!” the martial eagle at the helm yanked on his flight yoke, firing vernier thrusters to pull the dropship ahead of an air-burst munition, the shrapnel scraping agains their hull. Those strapped into the jump-seats held tight to their shoulder restraints, stomachs lurching to throats as the craft surged downwards through the melee.

 

This group was a mess of ex-military, medical and engineering crew; a rag-tag bunch dropping into an active warzone between two peoples: one was launching an orbital bombardment, the other with a solid defense. This teams’ goal was medical and nutritional supplies: first aid wasn’t meant to be political however the assignment was descending from the sky to provide support to impoverished peoples ensnared in the violence.

 

Feathered wing-fingers snapping switches, the Eagle called out to his crew: “lekker vector! drooping in fast!” A small squirrel took advantage of the lack of gravity, launching herself to the copilot’s seat. “Jaivyn,” she squealed at the eagle with a distinctly southern-American twang - “how you getting us through this blockade?” The eagle cracked a grin, giving the squirrel a side-eye: “simple my Sprouty, they cannot catch us.” He threw the yoke forward, throwing their dropship nose-down to the planet, launching all against their seat restraints. Several raiding gunships followed, shaking as they tried to keep up with the small dropship. Plasma singed against their hull, dull thunks of weak slugthrower-gunfire echoed against the hull. Their engines flared, launching the crew down into the planet:

 

“Sweet the sound, as all the stars come crashing down.

but I will wait for you.
Meet me in the blue.”

 

“That goddamn ancient trance music”, Sprout thought to herself as she kept track of the craft’s energy reserves, forcefields and engine output. The wild south african eagle was pushing their old girl to her limits while Sprout kept her above water. “Jaiv-AH” she squeaked as the dropship rolled over and over, squishing all into their seats, knocking the breath right out of them as the eagle spun them into a dive through a military blockade.

 

A big badger struggled within her restraints, eyes rolling back with every heavy-g maneuver from the bird. She struggled to breathe, being squished into her jump-seat. Eyelids drooping she held back puking all over the flight deck- she had tried to adapt to the eagle’s reckless flight… as much as one could. She could not.

 

“Afterglow, somethings you just don’t need to know. Came crashing in, battered your heart and bruised your shins…”

 

“Fucking raver bird,” Aldrea felt to herself as she wrapped her badger paws around the handles on the shoulder restraints, a soft plastic affair which barely held her size: it barely locked and clacked back and forth concerningly as the craft’s turbulence threw about its passengers. She was quite tall, hardy and hardly light: a European badger wearing a flight suit with body armor could barely stuff herself into the seat. The quartermaster badger glanced back at their secured cargo, which lifted and came crashing down as the wild bird descended into orbit.

 

Across from the miffed badger, a draft horse was similarly squeezed into the flight seats, himself struggling against the confines of the shoulder restraints. He had a large rifle secured to his right, an affair that clanked annoyingly about as the dropship swayed in the planet’s atmosphere. They locked gaze, and the goofy horse gave the badger a pair of finger guns: “it’s alll goooood,” he lisped as the craft sunk through the air, their fur lifting with the lack of gravity. “You got this gurl!” The horse was an annoyingly flirtatious dude and always trying to “preserve the vibe”. He too wore protective armor, and an advanced military helmet. The dork had a silver ring through his snout, which flopped about in the turbulence. Though he was heavily armed, he was meant to dissuade possible pirates and warlords from taking the aid meant for those on the planet: theft of aid was common and the mission was to deliver supplies to impoverished, war-torn communities and the horse was not about to allow that to happen.

 

“The day is calling you, roll out and start anew: wipe your weary eyes, and tumble out of the sky…

 

Out of the sky.”

 

Gliding to and fro in his stabilized chair, a gruff mountain dog managed the glowing monitors before him: sensors and cameras about their craft. His console tracked incoming fire and approaching foes, automatically routing their onboard and outboard defenses. His snout nodded to the beat of the silly bird’s music choices: at least the eagle could find the vibe. A few clicks and the doggy let loose their unmanned ordinance: a series of drones fitted with slugthrower tungsten canons, what for fucking up anyone who wished to go after them. The small, key shaped automatons took formation around the Ticonderoga, daring a bitch to try. The Ticonderoga were, and are a peacekeeping mission but self defense is both legal and paramount to survival.

 

The aid group was dropping through an active warzone: the upper atmosphere of the besieged planet flashed with bursts of anti-spacecraft flak; surface-to-space (STS) rockets from the planet slammed violently into flagships in orbit, sending their hulls careening across the sky.

The crew of the Ticonderoga winced, hiding their faces as bodies spewed into space, crews (perhaps needlessly) suffocating in the vacuum of space.

Attack cruisers shot their way ahead: behind and below their small ship. Jaivyn guided them through the mess, slipping past the dogfights between warring powers.  The sky lit with energy weapons shot to the surface. Bombing craft could be seen skirting orbit as they let-loose innumerable cluster-bombs on the impoverished world below. The crew grimaced, seeing the flashes of explosions upon the surface from orbit

Massive capitol ships, sustaining crippling damage from the surface guns, listed, crashing into each other as their fusion engines spewed dreamy bursts of plasma into the dark space. A beautiful sight…were it not so deadly. So pointless. Explosions ripped through their small ship, threatening to rattle it to pieces. Jaivyn at the helm deftly yawed the Ticonderoga around and through drifting debris. The blockade of battleships buckled in half, while others shuddered, immense naval guns blasting towards the planet below. The silence in the violence could be poetic: the only evidence of the melee was when the shockwaves shook their little dropship.

 

Locking his mobile station in place, Rusk flicked his pawtips across his terminals which gave him a complete view around the dropship through cameras and drones. Their gundrones swirled around the shrapnel and debris, giving the Ticonderoga cover as they slipped through the battle. The drones shuddered as they shot tungsten projectiles at tailing craft, evading the prohibited use of energy weapons by rescue orgs. Shattered unmanned tailing fighter craft splintered and ignited behind them. Rusk fed sensors ahead to Jaivyn: “Periapsis secured; velocity set, trajectory matched!” The dog slapped his paws across his board, tossing a trajectory at the eagle: the bird immediately rolled the dropship to begin descent. The wee squirrel Sprout held her gaze on her console, balancing the craft’s reserves against the eagle’s wild maneuvers. 

 

Fur and feathers floated upwards as the stubby-winged craft spun about, descending through the planet’s atmosphere. The hull glowed a deep blue, purple, then pink: it rocked to and fro, vibrating madly in the thick atmosphere as it fell into orbit around the besieged planet. The horse’s silver snout piercing floated in the air, catching the light. He caught his reflection in the mirror, giving the horse he saw a wink. The simple Clydesdale’s head joyfully drifting around in the turbulence. This dude loved this dumb shit, no thoughts between those ears as the bird’s classic EDM thudded through the ship as it careened through violent space. 

Aldrea on the other paw was struggling: she took a deep breath, closing her fiercely blue eyes, trying to find her zen. Her zen, sadly, was work, so holding her break she keyed the terminal beside her jump-seat. “Yulong guo (玉龙谷), Ōkami shōjo no shiro (狼少女の城), Hui Ni Gong (虎女宫) and Istana Kambing are our first stops.” She heaved and threw up a little in her mouth, eyes crossing as she swallowed it. “Gurl get it together.”

 

“Rhaen. RHAEN” the dog barked at the horse, who seemed to be dozing as the ship rattled through the stratosphere. The horse’s combat helmet clattered against the restraints, his rifle clacking around in its rack. The horse opened almost sleepy eyes at Rusk, and he stuck his tongue out: wut. “We have six cases of food, three cases of med and three cases of construction supplies. We dropping this or what?”

Sprout spun in her copilot seat, glaring at the horse, dog and badger. “Y’all better be ready once we hit the dirt!” She turned back to her controls, intently staring through the windscreen as Jaivyn guided them out of the sky.

 

“We get to offload this shit at the drop points,” the horse drawled, adjusting himself in the too-small safety straps. “Where they at?” Rusk spun about, with a wave of a paw throwing the waypoints onto a holographic display. Rhaen’s helmet flickered cheaply as it struggled to display the same.

 

The dropship shuddered, juking left and right as the anti-air ordinance blew space apart around them. Jaivyn’s almost prophetic avian flight skills deftly slipping past the ship-breaking flak.

 

Rhaen, Rusk and Aldrea addressed the holomap, a dynamic topographical display identifying villages where their cargo was needed most. Aldrea’s engineer helmet flashed to life, individual displays of her crewmates’ vitals. Rusk slid the feed to Jaivyn through his console, setting up their itinerary. The dog’s floppy ears floated upwards as their boat lost gravity.

 

The Ticonderoga slipped through the atmosphere of Nusantara, the planet under blockade. Freed of the frantic orbital warfare the badger and horse’s restraints popped free. Aldrea made her way to the cargo hold, keeping balance despite the pops and booms exploding about them. Grasping hand-holds in her big paws, she slung her way from crate to crate, checking each against her wrist-mounted manifest. Rhaen unlocked his rifle, clicking it into a sling, himself holding onto ceiling rails as the ship descended to their first target.